The State Department had a half day event for employees and guests about Mobile Money. Well attended and great interest in mobile money for “development” (improving political, economic, and human conditions around the world).

The group was diverse in experience – which is a challenge for a presenter. Since I co-presented the first session my goal was to create a common understanding of mobile money, how it is successfully implemented, and what are the benefits. I wanted to make sure the audience came up to speed quickly and got beyond the simplistic view.  The feedback was overwhelmingly positive about the opening session (partial credit goes to Jan Chipchase my co-presenter who started the session with a look at the needs of under-served people around the world) .

What is the role of State in Mobile Money

In conversations I learned that although State is enthusiastic about mobile money for development, their engagement model is still to be determined. They want to see these solutions go to places like Haiti as well as large markets like India. Yet I don’t think they yet know exactly what their role should be in helping make that happen. I was able to give them some initial input and plan to follow up in the coming weeks. Here are some of my thoughts on how they should get involved:

  1. Encouraging financial services regulatory certainty for mobile money. As they “encourage” they have vast resources of knowledge and experience on regulations.  Obopay operates in diverse regulatory environments – which is one of our great strengths. Yet it is prohibitive to launch mobile money in markets where regulation is uncertain.  State has the influence and resources to accelerate this in some cases.
  2. Discourage anti-competitive and anti-innovative practices. We have seen around the world financial and telecom actors take action to inhibit new entrants and innovation. The State Department can encourage mobile network operators and financial actors to adopt open access practices. This will encourage innovation and create a vibrant market. And this will in turn translate into more services reaching more people that need them.
  3. Help trusted actors connect. Especially important in challenging markets. We have passed the test and demonstrated we are trusted to US regulators as well as regulators and partners around the world and, as a result, we get inquiries from many developing countries (for example Nigeria, Pakistan). We would like the State Department to help local actors know about us, since we have the trust of US regulators. And we would like their help in understanding which local actors are good partners – especially in challenging countries. Of course, we would want this for the industry  – not just for Obopay.

Tell us about your other meetings in Washington DC.

I have to confess that although I have been to DC many times, I have never reached out to talk with law makers. I met with staff from 6 Congressmen and 1 Senator. I was impressed with how accessible their offices were and how open they were to discussing important topics with me. I wanted to focus on legislators who were involved in foreign affairs, and banking regulations—two areas where we have a great deal of experience to share.

All were keenly interested in mobile money – learning more, understanding how it works, asking how they can be helpful. Most meetings were primarily initial discussions but clearly there is opportunity to engage government in the dialogue and policy setting to ensure we maximize the opportunity to create growth and jobs.

One surprise was the lack of cross government coordination. I ended up educating people about what activities were going on in other agencies – treasury, state. Although we are a collaborative government in spirit, our size and complexity makes cross functional sharing difficult.

This administration is young and clearly tech enthusiasts. I am hoping that it will help build more communication between the Legislative and Executive branches. While most offices where watching CNN or CNBC – maybe in the future they will be reading blogs and watching tweets from each other. No question that social media should have a strong impact on intra agency communications

Do you expect follow up and results from your visit?

Hard to say. I know it was worthwhile to make the connections. I will keep in touch with many of the groups and individuals I connected with and we shall see what comes out of it. I have to admit it made me a little patriotic coming to Washington and meeting with different organizations. Despite all our challenges, we have many great qualities. One is the number of smart, passionate, hardworking people working on the “Hill”.

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